Walking With Dragons: Foreword
This is a book on dragons. Dragons as I see them. More specifically, as they exist in the world of Dragon Earth. Though the reader is encouraged to apply many of the ideas to the dragons of his invented world.
Why dragons?
Because we exhibit a strong and abiding interest in dragons. Dragons, under one name or another, are found everywhere Man is. From the Rainbow Serpent of the Australian Aborigine, to the secretive and disguised dragons of urban fantasy, dragons haunt our dreams and walk our city streets.
Dragons are power. Absolute power barely constrained. They are the powers who run the world; against which we feel powerless. In most tales it is the hero who vanquishes the dragon, but not the villagers banding together. The dragon is unassailable authority, tyranny incarnate.
At the same time the dragon is subtle in his power. He uses his puissance carefully, lest his subjects band together and overthrow him out of sheer desperation. A dragon is power carefully applied; for the dragon is a subtle beast and cunning in his vengeance.
For dragons are wisdom incarnate. They know many things, and even the meanest of them know things about you, you are reluctant to acknowledge.
The dragon is a madman's rage, a flood sweeping down the valley. The dragon is the elder night and the endless pit. The dragon is ancient wisdom wrapped in enigma and mystery confusing. The dragon is.
This is a book on dragons. Dragons of power, dragons of mystery. It is a natural history of dragons, and a book on their psychology. It is, above all, a book on dragons as people, and as individuals. The dragons of Dragon Earth go back to the days when the dinosaurs reigned, and some say they were before the first dinosaurs ever appeared. Some have worshipped them as gods.
So sit yourself in a good, comfortable chair, eliminate all distractions. (I hear reading to small children calms them down, and what better than a book on dragons?) Let yourself drift away from the mundane and enter the world of Walking With Dragons.
Walking With Dragons: Introduction
Dragons have been the subject of many books. Some serious, some frivolous, some even good. In the field of roleplaying games dragons have appeared in many efforts, even when they really weren't appropriate to the milieu or genre. The very first roleplaying game acknowledged the preeminence of dragons by incorporating dragon into its name.
Walking With Dragons began as my look at the beast in that game, but grew to be something more. A world, Dragon Earth, was created for my dragons, and has taken on a life of its own.
The once generic dragons from the d20 SRD became the creatures you will find in this volume.
Why dragons?
Because, in my considered opinion, dragons have not been well handled in other RPG books. All too often they are but things to be slain for the glory of brigands and thieves. No consideration is given to their role in the wider world; how they impact the environment, and how their deaths might change things; more often than one might think, for the worst.
I also wanted to do a scientific work on dragons, but dragons as presented in fantasy and RPGs, not as typically presented in works purporting to show how dragons might be were they to exist in the real world. That's pretty much why Dragon Earth was created, so that I could have a world where magic worked, and followed scientific laws.
That's the thing about dragons, they need magic. Without magic dragons could not fly. Without magic dragons would be but gigantic beasts with gigantic appetites and bestial minds. Without magic dragons would live on marginal lands set aside for their preservation, or on exhibit in zoos and animal parks.
Some people have tried presenting a 'real-world' dragon. A dragon that could exist in the real world and have many of the characteristics of the dragon of the stories. What they usually come up with is some sad sack of a gas bag. A hydrogen filled balloon with the survival potential of a lion cub in the middle of a cape buffalo herd. A pathetic loser with no real control over where it can go and what it can do. This is no dragon.
No, good reader, what you shall find in this work are dragons. Dragons as they appear in stories around the world. Dragons as they very well might be if we lived in a world where magic works and science can be applied to all investigative endeavors.
That is the world of Walking with Dragons.
